Hi everyone!I always check that I have the latest driver for my graphic card and the latest DirectX. But I've never checked the drivers/updates for BIOS, motherboard, CPU etc. I'm totally lost when it comes to these technical things. I mean, is BIOS, CPU and motherboard the same thing? Do I have to upgrade this or is it enough with having the latest Graphic drivers and DirectX?I'm grateful for all answers, please help.My specs:P4 3.0 Ghz512 RAM120 Gb HDRadeOn 9800 128 MbDirectX 9cCatalyst 4.8 graphic driverThank you,Tomas

Tomas - It's a good idea to never update your BIOS unless there is a known reason for doing so. Especially if one is totally lost when it comes to these technical things :-) . There is always the risk of totally losing all access to the machine if the BIOS update fails. My advice is to not worry about the BIOS as you'll probably never need an update.Doug

i allways update my BIOS to the latest avaialble generally i use a utility that does this from within windows, this practice has in the past allowed me keep using a modo with newer graphics cards as the updates included updates to the AGP slot allowing increases from the original AGP to AGP x 4, that said last month i made a simple mistake and used the BIOS for a NF7-S2 when i should have used the one for a NF7-Sv2, my system would still boot but it was "sick" to say the least. i was unable to rescue the BIOS by flashing it with the correct file, so my only option was to replace the BIOS chip with a new one from the Manufacturer. the cost was not high and the job was very easy, but it was a very worrying situation; had i damaged anything irreprably was i going to lose all my valuable work, would i be able to get back my may hundreds of pounds worth of software, etc., etc. Fortunatly all was back up and running a week after the "accident", and i never actually was totaly without a PC still being able to use the PC for "basic" things like e-mail, surfing, and word processing/printing.Basically it can go wrong and if you are having to ask about it possibly it is not a good idea. As Doug says if you do not need any updates best not to do it.Alternatvily it may be a lot safer to contect your board manufactuter and just buy the latest chip, they are pretty cheap. alternativly if you can do without your PC for a weeek or so sent your chip to th emanufacturer and get them to flash it for you, they should do it for a very small charge.

Sound good, Doug, thanks. I was hoping I didn't have to mess around with the things I haven't got a clue about. Do you know if there's a revolutionary way to get better frame rates? I know there's like hundereds of things you can do but is there one or two things that really shows result, things everyone do?Tomas

Thanks, Bruce. I'll let it be for now then. I don't have any srious problems with my computer. I just want to know if there are any revolutionary and easy ways to get better performance in FS9.Tomas

Well, you're system is certainly OK. But there is no "magic bullet" for getting higher framerates. About the best I can say is that the two big framerate killers are weather (the clouds) and AI traffic. If you try flying in clear weather and with no AI trffic I think you'll find the framerates quite good. But, as you'll see, when you add back the clouds and traffic the framerates will drop dramatically. One other thing you can do that will really help is to disable the file named default.xml that you can find in the Autogen folder. You will lose the grocery stores and fast food restaurants but it's hardly noticeable and the performance improvement is well worth it. Just rename the file to something else (like default.xml.disabled).Doug

TomasIf you go to your motherboard manufactures web site there should be a list of BIOS updates along with any improvements made and/or problems solved by each update. This will give you an idea whether you have any reason to update, or reasure you that you have no need to. You should also find a list of motherboard chipset drivers. These are easy to install and having the latest (if you don't already) can improve performance.David